Fighting to live, Living to fight
by korben600
Summary: As with every story I've ever told, this one starts with, "One day I got really bored, so..." Thought of the day: "What would have happened if Cassandra Cain AKA Black Bat met Superboy from Young Justice?"
1. Chapter 1

**Patterson New York  
** **December 11th 9:00 pm**

"Come on dude, we need to _move_ or else we're dead meat!" Blurted out a hyperactive speedster who was trying to physically drag his friend out the front door

"What's the rush? The party doesn't start for 2 hours." The confused kryptonian hybrid who was being pulled was befuddled by friend's haste, given the fact that said friend was able to break the sound barrier with startling regularity, and the fact that moving a reticent kryptonian was extremely hard to accomplish.

"Yeah but Gotham City is an hour away"

"Why would we go to Gotham city?"

"Because that's where Artemis lives dummy!"

"She does, then how did she become Green Arrow's sidekick?"

"I think Bat's and Arrow made some sort of arrangement, something about dual training, how do you think she got those self-defense moves"

"Oh"

"NOW CAN YOU PLEASE MOVE!"

"OH, right sorry" He said as he sheepishly began to walk out Wally's front door and followed his friend to the car

As Wally buckled up, he looked at Connor, "Aren't you going to buckle up" he said. At Superboy's raised eyebrow over the fact that he was nearly indestructable, Wally continued, "I know you don't need it, but if the cops see you without a seatbelt, we'll get pulled over" "Fine, but the belt is more likely to break than I am". As Wally began the car a followup thought occurred to Superboy "Wally, why are we taking this, couldn't you just run to Gotham or something"

The ex-Kid Flash, exasperated by his friend's constant questions, replied "NO, geez Supey, haven't you ever been to Gotham before?"

"Of course I have" he replied defensively "..." "On one of our first missions when we had to disable Amazo, remember!"

"No, I mean go to Gotham for fun, or for a non-team related reason" "Oh, no, I haven't" "Okay, listen, Batman has a few rules in Gotham, before the Team, he had a strict no-metas policy in Gotham city and for the most part everyone obeyed it" Connor interrupted, "Isn't Batman a founding member of the Justice League, for a guy in his position, that seems borderline racist" "I'm getting to that, mostly everyone was content to stay out of Gotham, and as Bat's interacted with the league, he began to lighten up a bit, letting in a few heroes he trusted, Superman, Wonder Woman, et cetera. But that all changed with Superman" "Superman? What'd he do?" "He was helping Batman patrol, when Poison Ivy attacked, she used spores to control him and send him on a rampage" Superboy unconsciously shivered at the thought, he knew what it was like being out of control, that happening to his (for lack of a better descriptor) father scared him in more ways than one. "What happened?" "Batman happened, he took down Poison Ivy and called in the League to restrain Superman, but not before he decimated a city block" "Was anyone hurt?" "No, Gotham evacuation protocols are very efficient, but Batman reinforced his No-Meta's policy again"

"But I've been in Gotham before on missions, and I've never heard of any of this" "It was before you were born, plus you were with the Team, the way Nightwing explained it, Bat's gives us a lot of leeway because as a covert team, we're better suited to help him in Gotham. Bat's needs Metahuman help in Gotham on occasion, but the Justice League is too flashy and too big of a target for the villains." "So as a members, or ex-members of the team, we're allowed to go to the city?" "No, as members of the team we are allowed to operate missions in the city, which is more than most of the League is allowed. But anyone is allowed to go to the city as long as they do it as civilians going into the city via normal means, so no flying, speeding, teleporting, or Zetaing into Gotham, hence the car. Besides, the Watchtower and the Cave are undergoing hard reboots, so intercontinental comms and zetas are off anyway." "That still doesn't explain why you want to get there an hour early"

Wally, who had stopped them at an intersection, gave an incredulous to the man riding shotgun and glibly shot out"Because she's my girlfriend! Those of us who have them generally try to love and support them as much as possible."

Superboy's expression immediately hardened, and Wally realized about three seconds too late what he just said. Connor had recently gone through a apocalyptic breakup with his longtime girlfriend and this was one of his first times out in a week. Wally had hoped to get him hooked up with new people at the party, but by the look on Connor's face his faux pas may have ruined it.

"Connor, I'm sorry dude, I forgot for a second..." "Just drop it."

The rest of the car ride to Gotham passed in silence.


	2. Chapter 2

**Gotham City  
** **December 11th 9:48 pm**

Thankfully the traffic had shortened the ride so that they made it to Gotham with time to spare, and the 48 minutes had given Connor enough time to cool off. By the time they got within city limits he was ready to talk again and wanted to apologize to Wally. "So, uh" he started sheepishly "Whose party are we going to, you never specified" Realizing this as an attempt to breach the awkwardness in the car, Wally launched into an in depth explanation of the 'Start of Winter Break Party' that was being hosted at Wayne Manor.

Connor was paying close attention to the admittedly funny story of how Artemis came to be in charge of planning the thing, when all hell broke loose.

"...so the kid falls into her and grabs her, she has him in a headlock in about 3 seconds, and he has to explain that h-" _***BOOM***_ the bank next to their car explodes outward with people fleeing.

"Woah!" Wally blurts out, as first responders began to arrive "Looks like the fire department has it covered, geez, only in Gotham, am I right Con-" trailing off as he realized the passenger seat was already empty "Aw Nertz..."

Superboy, already running towards the blaze was using his superhuman hearing to catalogue who was in the building and who was not. He caught glimpses of voices _"just got out" "it seemed like an explosion" "is everyone out?" "where's Sheila" "I thought she was right behind us" "where did you last see her?" "second floor" "she's still in there!"_ he strained even more to hear anyone inside the flames and just on the edge of his hearing he heard a heartbeat and a faint _"Help me, please, help me"_. His standing stock still was beginning to be noticed, and one of the firefighters was about to warn him to get out of the way when he dove into the flames.

Walking around the interior of the bank , he stumbled forward, pulling his shirt up over his mouth to block out some of the smoke and decide just to rip off a bandanna size strip of his shirt, tieing it around his face. Once he was done he began to hear a voice in his ear, "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING!" How he forgot that he still had his earpiece on was beyond him, but he had more pressing matters at the moment. "Wally, shut up, I am trying to wade through fire here, and unless you are going to help get off the line." he could hear an audible sigh from him and Wally spoke again "fine, I'm coming into the building, give me a second" "No, don't, it's too hot for normal humans, and the oxygen content is almost negligible, if I weren't kryptonian and had less of a need for it, I would be on the verge of passing out, besides, haven't you heard of a backdraft" "Backdraft: a dramatic event caused by a fire, resulting from rapid re-introduction of oxygen to combustion in an oxygen-depleted environment" Wally repeated automatically, before realizing... "Oh, right, if I speed in there I could worsen the blaze, WAIT, how the hell do you know what a backdraft is?" "Lets just say that movie night is extremely informative, now are you going to help me or not?!" "Alright, what do you need?" "Thanks, listen I need the safest route through this building, I can handle a lot but anyone I carry or lead through will probably be only human" "What kind of fires do you see?" " Mostly orange, but some blue, and green, flames sporadically, about 2 feet high" "okay..." Connor could hear the tapping of a phone while Wally researched it "Oh man, listen closely, this looks like a chemical fire, and those that you're describing are hot enough to structurally compromise the building, whatever you do, try not to break the walls, it could be enough to bring it crashing down on you, and you might not survive several tons of molten steel crashing down on you." "Understood"

Superboy began to walk to a side door to the stairs and began to head to the second floor. When he got there, he stopped to listen and detected five heartbeats, one on this floor and the rest below he walked to the closest one, around the corner. Said heartbeat was coming from a blonde woman who was trapped under a beam and was desperately trying to get out from under it. He ran to her, and said "Listen, stay calm, I'm going to lift this, but you are going to need to move" she nodded in assent, "Ready, Set, GO!" she scrambled out from under it and he dropped it back down. She was unsteady on her feet, and could barely stand, Connor asked "Can you walk?" she was about to nod when she nearly collapsed onto him. "Come on" he muttered to himself and grabbed her, putting her into a fireman's carry and began to walk towards the stairs. The door was jammed and he felt a wave of heat coming down the corridor. Realizing that a wall of flame was coming towards him he furiously tried the door, before realizing that it was futile, and he kicked the door in, throwing himself and the lady down the staircase, and covering her body with his own to protect her from the heat.

As the heat subsided, he threw the lady over his shoulder again and ran down the stairs kicking open the door at the bottom and rushing to the front entrance and delivering the woman to the firefighters. Medics swarmed her, and carried her to an ambulance, muttering things about smoke inhalation. One of the firefighters was patting Connor on the back, saying "Nice job kid, that has got to be one of the bravest and stupidest things I've ever seen" "Thanks, but I'm not done yet" "Woah woah woah, kid, first off, let us do our jobs, second, what do you mean you're not done yet, that was the last person out of the building" "There are four more people inside the building" "Kid, this is Gotham City, we have the best evacuation protocols in the country, when we say that everyone is out of the building, everyone is out of the building, the only way there's someone in there, is if they want to be in there." With that thought, Superboy's thoughts clicked, and he froze, realizing what the firefighter just said. He muttered to himself "Gee, who would want to get stuck in an empty bank?"

Oblivious to the firefighter trying to reason him back he ran back into the fire, this time heading straight for the vault in the back where he could hear the would-be bank robbers making off with jewels _"Damn this is some fine ice" "Easiest job I've had" "Let's hurry, I don't want to stay in a burning building any longer than I have to" "You ready to blow this joint" "Hell yeah, this whole place is going to go up"._ Connor stopped to hide behind a nearby desk, peeking out to see four men in leather coats similar to his own raiding the bank's vault. He calmed down and thought about his course of action _I can take these guys, but I don't think I'd be able to get them all out of here in time_ _,_ "Wally, you still there?" "Yeah" "Listen, remember how you could create a backdraft," "Yeah, why?" "I've got four bank robbers, can you get them an incentive to leave?" Connor could hear the grin in his tone as he said "Consider it done"

About a second later Superboy saw a flash of his friend pass by and about a half of a second behind him a pocket of air that created a wall of flame attempting to engulf the arsonists. "Damn, this is getting worse, alright, guys, let's get out of here" the largest one said, and with that the rest of the would be bank robbers followed him out the back.

Conner opted for a side door, kicking it outward and running around the side not bothering to take off his makeshift mask. He rounded around the side and seeing them, yelled for them to stop. This being Gotham, where nothing is easy they fired at him with some strange guns. More on instinct rather than necessity, he dived to the side just in time, with only one bullet hitting him. He didn't even know why he bothered to try dodge the bullets since he was invulnerable, then a splitting pain went through his arm. He looked down to see that his arm was bleeding from a bullethole, which scared him more than the burning building he left behind. Gritting his teeth, he ripped off another piece of his shirt and used it as a makeshift bandage to stop the bleeding. He tapped his ear to call Wally "We might have a problem" he said through gritted teeth. "What's wrong" "I've been shot" "So what'd their faces look like when the bullets bounced off" "NO, I mean I've been shot and it broke through the skin" "What do you mean, what broke though your skin?" "Gee, I don't know, the thing that is making me bleed in the street from the **bullet hole** in **my arm**!" Conner nearly shouted. "Holy crap, you mean it actually hurt you and everything?" Wally stated in a disbelieving tone. "Yeah, I really hate Gotham right about now" "No kidding, okay listen, I'm gonna speed around the block and knock out all of these guys before they can blink, okay?" "Wait" Conner said, controlling his breathing so he wouldn't go into shock. "This bullet doesn't feel like kryptonite, otherwise I would be dead by now, which means that whatever they shot me with was powerful enough to break my skin, you aren't wearing armor, and no offense, you're out of shape" "None taken, but you really need sensitivity training" "I have it, I just ignore it when **I'm shot** " "Okay, Okay, jeez" "Listen, if this is what happens to me, imagine what it'll do to you." "Alright, Alright, but I'm not standing here on my duff, I'll try to get help but comm's are still down, I'll drag the entire league if I can but what the hell are you going to do?" "This is Gotham right?" "Yeah, why?" "What would Batman do?" "I don't know" "Neither do I, and as he's not here right now, I'm the only hero between them and the rest of Gotham" "Good luck man, I'll be back in a Flash"


End file.
